Today, version 380 of the private beta landed and it brings with it, once again, some fantastic new features. A member of the beta program has given us the following screenshots, though we’ve been able to independently confirm their authenticity.

Privacy control

One of the big new additions is something that is new to Android and iOS too, namely privacy control. Remember how you can always see when the last time someone was online with WhatsApp? Pretty soon, users will be able to control that via the privacy settings. From there, you will be able to control:

Last seen – Everyone, My Contacts or Nobody

Profile Photo – Everyone, My Contacts or Nobody

Status – Everyone, My Contacts or Nobody

Admittedly, that’s a very useful feature. What’s neat though, as mentioned above, as that’s a relatively new feature to iOS and Android too, meaning that Windows Phone is finally nearing parity with those platforms. In fact, by the time this release comes out, they may well very be matched.

Interestingly, it’s not a one way street though. If you disable your status, the app – as of now – also hides your contact’s status as well. So while you can protect your activity, you won’t be able to see someone else’s either. We’re guessing that because WhatsApp just enabled this, users will have to opt-in to have their status shown, with the default being ‘nobody’.

New background gallery

Background images were revealed the last time by us from the previous beta release. In today’s version, the WhatsApp team has added a ‘background gallery’ replete with six well designed wallpapers. That’s in addition to

Take a photo

Choose from Albums

Search Web

Delete

Background images do bring a little bit of life to the otherwise minimalist app, though users can still opt for the default black background should they choose.

Until yesterday i was cool with Whatsapp.But today i'm mad.Fuck all these features.First fix the damn crashing of the app.I tried to send photos ONE by ONE yet it crashed everytime.Getting sick of whatsapp.Hope they make the chat interface like Droid or IOS as well as browsing of chat history.Anyways nice going but it can be better.

Bro its now fbs product u think they will. Ppl use many messengers like watsapp,bbm,we chat,Skype,line etc. Everyone will demand for integration to people hub. I know integrated watsapp will big free and freaking smooth but still

Hey WhatsApp, u should not allow the Privacy settings for last seen , because this also one of the reason to having a constant Chatting on the application, since our friends already know that we have seen their message and we had to reply and inturn they had to reply as well. If u allow Privacy settings for this, communication will never be the same again. Common Facebook, you will gonna waste 18 B$.

They asked for my live id 4 days ago
next day i received an email from them which said that my id will be added to the system blah blah blah
....still waiting for the link...
maybe I'm gonna have to wait for a few weeks >_<

1) Fix the issue of the app closing when reading chat history from few pages up
2) Color profile for individuals in Group Chat
3) Fix the issue of opening pic and video from chat history - sometimes it just won't open the media. Have to relaunch it to do that.

Once they fix that, only you can say that it can match Android's or IOS' version finally.

Oh, you're going to see this.. In beta's of whatsapp all over. Just never in the final version. All neat things, only in the closed beta. Then you have to wait for months, just getting more eta news, but never a new final with these features. :')

yeah,some nice minimalist backgounds for the entire os.it's not just about the start screen, but about every system app.put more color choices for the themes, not just black and white. add grey,blue,green maybe with gradients.it would breathe more life in the look of the os